Facebook hits one billion user milestone

SOCIAL NETWORK Facebook has revealed that it now has more than one billion people actively using its website every month, up from 900 million back in April.

Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg announced the milestone in, of course, a post on Facebook. He said, "This morning, there are more than one billion people using Facebook actively each month."

"If you're reading this: thank you for giving me and my little team the honour of serving you. Helping a billion people connect is amazing, humbling and by far the thing I am most proud of in my life."

"I am committed to working every day to make Facebook better for you, and hopefully together one day we will be able to connect the rest of the world too."

However, Facebook's user numbers are not independently verified. It's also unclear how "active" these users are, although Zuckerberg boasted back in April, when Facebook hit the 900 million figure, that 525 million of its users logged on to the website on a daily basis. He didn't mention whether all of these accounts are real, either, despite having admitted earlier this year that Facebook was home to 83 million fake accounts, 10 percent of its userbase.

Still, this announcement couldn't come at a better time for Facebook, as it will hope to see an uptick in the company's share price. Just last week, the website's share price fell eight percent following rumours that users' private messages were being displayed on public timelines.

Facebook could not be reached for comment at the time of writing. µ